Blog | Cardigan Bay Honey - Welsh Honey and Beeswax Products

Tip 8: Swarm control

In order to collect a good honey crop it is vital to try to control swarming as much as possible.

February 24^th 2021

Tip 7: Don’t let your bees starve

as their custodians it is the beekeepers responsibility to ensure they always have stores be that honey stores or replacement feed.

February 23^rd 2021

Tip 6: Using your smoker

The smoker is a very necessary piece of kit and as with the bee suit is worth investing wisely in a good one that will hopefully last you a lifetime. The two main types are the straight nose or bent nose, the latter being more efficient and easier to keep alight.

February 22^nd 2021

Tip 5: Beekeepers avoid getting stung by wearing proper PPE

A bee sting is painful, there are no two ways about it; they are unpleasant and too many can put off a "Newbee" quickly, which is a shame because with care and proper personal protective equipment (PPE) getting stung is mostly preventable.

February 21^st 2021

Tip 4: Don’t open your hive too much.

Often when beekeepers start out, they are very understandably excited but have a tendency to check, fiddle and open their hives far too often.

February 20^th 2021

Tip 3: Choosing a site for your hives

Where are you going to site your new hives? When choosing your apiary site there are a few things to consider, keep in mind convenience to you and comfort for the bees and your neighbours. Farms and smallholdings often have odd, unused corners or awkward shaped bits of land where fields join, these can be…

February 19^th 2021

Tip 2: Start with more than one hive

Tip 2: For beginner beekeepers. Start with more than one hive, a pair or even better three. Nucleus’s (Nuc’s) can usually be bought from a local beekeeper and are comprised of 4 or 5 frames of bees with a queen. These can later be transferred into your prepared hive brood box with empty frames with…

February 18^th 2021

10 beekeeping tips for beginners “Newbees”!

Over the next ten days we will be sharing daily tips for new beekeepers here on our website. We hope that they will be of use and help inspire you with your new bees or to take the leap into the exciting and addictive hobby. Starting with Tip 1: Join your local beekeeping association and…

February 17^th 2021

Calling out honey fraud

With the rise in interest in honey for its health benefits and as a natural sugar alternative there have been recent reports of an influx of cheaper sometimes 'fake' honey entering the market

February 6^th 2021

Taking the bees to the Heather

If you get it right, like we did in 2017, the heather flow can be like ‘turning on a tap’ of nectar. The flow is short, lasting around 4-6 days but if it happens a beekeeper can expect a bountiful harvest of the distinctive, premium, honey product.

August 19^th 2019

Catching a Swarm

Today we visited our furthest apiary which is located in the foothills of the Preseli Mountains. The weather was beautifully sunny and its a joy to get out together and do some actual beekeeping following days inside potting honey. It was time to put clearer boards onto the hives in readiness for collecting honey tomorrow.…

June 3^rd 2019

Spring Honey Collecting

The weather has been kind this Spring and the bee colonies are strong so we have got a bumper "best ever" Spring crop to collect. Today we went to collect spring honey from one of our apiaries. The honey that is collected at this time of year is primarily from the tree blossoms; mostly blackthorn,…

May 9^th 2019

First Pollen Harvest

The pollen traps worked like a dream. Too well in fact so we had to ensure we didn’t take too much from any one colony so as not to deprive them of their ‘bee bread’.

April 4^th 2019

Bees Busy Bringing in the Pollen

We visited 2 more apiaries today and witnessed many different colours of pollen sacks on the bees today. From each flower they visit, bees collect pollen, which contains the male reproductive cells of those plants. The bees take that pollen and combine it with a bit of nectar and their own digestive enzymes to create…

March 7^th 2019

A Bit of Good Weather

It was an uncharacteristically warm and sunny February day today. Ceri planned for us to use this opportunity to check some of the coastal apiary sites as there has been some high winds.

February 17^th 2019

Wax Frames

Its winter and cold outside. As always are jobs to do. We still attend farmers markets every week either in Swansea or Aberystwyth so there is always ongoing honey potting to do and wax products to make.

January 29^th 2019

All about Beeswax

Beeswax is a secretion from the 8 wax producing glands on the worker bees abdomen. The bees eat their honey stores and wax is secreted in the form of scales. They use this wax to produce the hexagonal patterned cells that make honey comb.

January 12^th 2019

The Bee Keepers Diary